Foreign tourists that visited Brazil during the first eight months of the ongoing year spent little more than $2.1 billion, up 36.4 percent from the same period of time in 2003. According to statistics provided by the country´s Central Bank, the amount of money spent by foreign travelers in the country and the number of Brazilians traveling overseas combine for a $355 million surplus for the local leisure industry, compared to $87 million the South American nation came in for in the first eight months of last year. In 2003, Brazil welcomed 4.1 million foreign tourists that shelled out some $3.4 billion in all.

Marriott Hotels is planning to build a new lodging facility in the Nicaraguan Pacific coast. The 250-room establishment with an in-house casino will take an initial investment of $50 million. Sources close to the project told Caribbean News Digital that $5 million have already been poured into the new resort, most of it for groundbreaking works. The new colonial-style hotel will be located in the municipality of Villa El Carmen, some 22 miles northwest of Managua.

Leaders of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) agreed to finance the reconstruction of Grenada for the next three months on the heels of a devastating hurricane that hit the island last week. CARICOM members decided to join funds and efforts to rebuild the island after hurricane Ivan razed nearly 90 percent of all houses and buildings and inflicted serious damage to the nation’s crops and leisure industry. The decision was made within the framework of an emergency meeting held this week in Trinidad & Tobago.

The economy of urban hubs stand for over fifty percent of Gross Domestic Products (GDP) worldwide, even though in the case of Latin American and Caribbean nations that figure could soar to just about 80 percent. That’s the conclusion of a recent report issued in Geneva by the United Nations Program for Human Settlements (UN-Habitat) and that labels Mexico as a good case in point. The Aztec nation’s ten biggest cities –comprising only a third of the entire population- generate 62 percent of the country’s GDP.

Canada is importing an increasingly larger amount of goods from South America, Central America, Mexico and the Caribbean, according to Statistics Canada, a state-run agency. Trade flow between Canada and South American countries has grown in double digits over the past months, especially with Brazil, Chile and Venezuela.

World Bank officials informed this week the institution’s intention to lend Peru $5 million to help authorities there protect the ruins of Machu Picchu and the Incas’ Sacred Valley, the country’s two best-known cultural heritage sites. Each day, as many as two thousand people visit Machu Picchu, the Inca citadel perched atop the Peruvian Andes. That figure has been growing at a 6 percent annual rate, local tourism authorities say.